by K J Taylor
The woman’s eyes opened, and Arren jerked backward in shock.
Her eyes were not human. They were burning gold from edge to edge, without any whites or irises, and the pupils were jet black. As Arren sat there staring in bewilderment, they turned and focused on him.
The woman suddenly came alive, starting up and scrabbling at the ground beneath her, hissing. But she was still weak; she couldn’t sit up and fell back onto the grass, breathing heavily.
Arren tried to restrain her. “You’re safe,” he said. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
The woman recoiled at his touch. “Do not touch me, slave,” she rasped.
The words were spoken in griffish. “I’m not a slave,” he snapped, unable to bite back on the anger that word automatically provoked. “I saved you.”
She snarled back at him. Her eyes, fixed on his face, were full of hate. “Come near me and I will kill you with my teeth,” she promised.
Arren drew away, both shocked and concerned. “Please, don’t try and get up. Just lie back. I promise I won’t come near you if you don’t want me to, but you need to rest. You nearly died.”
She subsided, panting. “I—am—not weak, human.”
“I didn’t say you were. No, you’re strong. I can tell.”
That seemed to mollify her a little. “How did you find me?”
“You were in that pond,” said Arren, gesturing toward it. “I saw you in there and pulled you out. How did you get in there? What’s your name?”
The woman was silent for a time. “Named Skade,” she said at last.
“Skade,” said Arren. “That’s a nice name. I’m—well, no-one much.”
“You are blackrobe,” said Skade.
Even now, the word struck a painful blow. “Yes,” he said. “I suppose I am. How do you feel?”
She made another attempt to get up, and then lay back again. “Do not touch me.”
“I won’t,” Arren promised. “Rest there. I’ll look after you.”
She didn’t reply. She stared up at the sky for a while, unmoving, and then closed her eyes. Arren got up and wandered around, hoping to find some food. There were a few berries growing on a bush not far away; he cautiously tasted one and found it was sweet and juicy. He picked the rest of them and stuffed them in his pocket, then found a sharp stick and dug around for grubs and roots. He eventually found some; they were thin and dirty, but he pocketed them anyway. This done, he started to hunt through the grass and turn over rocks, looking for lizards. The odds of finding another as big as the one he had caught that morning were very poor, but he tried anyway. Patient searching eventually turned up a skink about as large as his hand. He knew Skandar wouldn’t be happy, but it would just have to do.
When he returned to the clearing he found Skade still asleep. She had rolled onto her side and was curled up, one hand resting under her chin. Arren pulled the robe over her and set to work building a fire. He’d done it a hundred times before, and by now it was almost a reflex action. He cleared a patch of earth and laid out a circle of rocks, then heaped dry grass and twigs inside it. Larger sticks went on top, and he found a chunk of a fallen log and laid that in the centre. Then, sitting cross-legged beside it, he took a piece of flint from his pocket and struck it against the blade of his knife, directing the sparks onto the dry grass. It caught, and he dropped the flint and blew on the grass as gently as he could, until it began to smoke. The smoke increased, and then true flames appeared and the grass began to burn. Arren sheathed his knife and added more grass and twigs until the whole thing was well ablaze, constantly glancing over his shoulder to check on Skade. She hadn’t moved, but he could see her breathing. She would be fine.
His stomach was churning with hunger, so he spitted some grubs on a stick and cooked them over the fire. They didn’t actually taste bad, but the texture still made him pull a face. He put a few aside for Skade, along with some roots and half of the berries he’d gathered, and ate the rest. It would probably be more sensible to save some of it for later, but he was too hungry to care.
Once he’d eaten, he added more fuel to the fire and went to check on Skade. His curiosity was so powerful that he couldn’t help it. He wanted to know about her. Who she was, where she had come from, why she was out here. And how she knew griffish. Could she be a griffiner? But surely if she was, then her griffin would be with her. She looked thin and exhausted and ragged, like himself. Was she a fugitive?
And if so, what was she running from?
He sat close, watching her and debating whether to wake her up and ask, but before he could make a decision he glanced up and saw Skandar flying overhead.
The black griffin landed not far from the fire and dropped a bloody bundle in front of Arren. “Food,” he said, almost sternly.
It was a dead sheep, whole and virtually undamaged. Arren examined it, utterly astonished. “Skandar, where in the gods’ names did you get this from?”
Skandar sat back and made a rather unpleasant choking sound, almost a burp. “Many food,” he said. “Field, fence. I eat many. This one yours.”
Arren went cold. “Did anyone see you? Were there any humans there?”
“No. I look first.”
“Are you sure?”
Skandar rolled onto his side. His stomach was bulging. “I look first,” he said again. “Then eat. You eat now.”
Arren didn’t need telling twice. He dragged the sheep a short way into the brush and began to butcher it, clumsy in his eagerness. The sheep was fat and healthy, and its wool was thick. It must have come from a rich pasture. In spite of his hunger, Arren skinned it before he began stripping the meat from the carcass. The hide could be extremely useful. Once he’d scraped it clean and laid it out flat to dry, he cut several large pieces of meat from the sheep’s hind legs and spitted them over the fire before he began on the rest, not noticing the mess or the blood coating both his arms.
Skandar watched him with a lazy, indulgent air, having eaten so much he could barely move. “Good food,” he muttered.
“Oh yes,” said Arren. He could already smell the meat beginning to cook. “This is wonderful, Skandar. Perfect. I’m so hungry I was starting to wonder if I could eat ants.”
Skandar looked at him with an almost fond expression in his silver eyes. “My human,” he said.
Arren paused in his work and sighed. Skandar wasn’t Eluna, but he cared in his own way. He was self-centred and unpredictable, but he was every bit as loyal as any griffin was toward his partner.
Arren remembered the night of Rannagon’s murder, when Skandar had come to help him fight. The black griffin had stood between him and Rannagon’s griffin, Shoa, head low, hissing and menacing her. “Mine!” he had shouted, again and again. “Mine! My human.”
Skandar was looking at Skade. “Human dead?”
“No,” said Arren. “She’s just sleeping.”
The black griffin did not look happy. “You help her. Why?”
“Because she needs it,” said Arren. “That’s why.”
Skandar was silent for a time. He looked deep in thought. He often looked that way when he was about to say something. His griffish was slow and clumsy, but it was improving steadily. Much of the time he was monosyllabic only because using longer sentences took more effort than he was willing to give.
“You say—other human dangerous,” he said eventually. “You say, hide. Not be seen. If human find us, they kill you. Kill me.”
“Yes, I did,” said Arren.
Skandar looked pointedly at Skade. “She human. She see you.”
“That’s different,” said Arren.
“Different?”
“She’s on her own,” said Arren. “She’s not looking for us. And anyway, she doesn’t know who we are.”
“She remember,” Skandar said darkly. “She talk. Tell them. They find you. Take you. Kill you.”
“I know, but—look, if we help her, maybe she’ll help us. She’ll be grateful. You know? I helped you and y
ou didn’t kill me. So it’s the same.”
“Not same,” said Skandar. “Human enemy. Kill her.”
“No.”
“Kill her,” Skandar said again. “You say, kill anyone if they see us. Kill her.”
“I can’t do that,” said Arren.
Skandar started to hiss softly. “You kill Rannagon. Kill her like him.”
Murderer.
“No, Skandar,” said Arren. “I won’t do that again. Skade hasn’t done anything to hurt me, or you. She could be our friend. And I want to know who she is.”
“What Skade?”
Arren nodded toward the sleeping woman. “That’s her name. She told me.”
Skandar stood up. “If you not kill, I kill.”
“Skandar, no. I won’t let you.”
Skandar’s head turned sharply toward him. “Why?”
Arren moved to Skade’s side, laying a protective hand on her shoulder. “She could help us,” he said urgently. “Don’t you understand? We’re lost, Skandar. We’ve been lost for months. Maybe she can tell us where we are, help us get to Norton at last. We have to get there as soon as we can. If my parents get there before we do, what if they get caught? If the news has spread, they’ll be arrested. Maybe tortured. The griffiners won’t rest until they find me. Find us.”
Skandar listened. He sat back on his haunches, apparently digesting all this. “Skade help?”
“Yes. She speaks griffish, Skandar. Like me. She must be educated.”
“Edu-ded?” Skandar tried.
“Educated. It means knowing things. She could know things we need to know. Understand?”
“And if Skade not know? Not help?” said Skandar.
“Then we’ll leave her. Make her promise not to tell anyone. In return for saving her life.”
Skandar retreated and lay down on his belly. “I do not like this,” he said. It was one of the first phrases Arren had taught him.
Arren realised he’d left a smear of sheep’s blood on Skade’s forehead. He wiped it off with a corner of the robe and went back to the carcass. “I know it’s risky,” he said. “But sometimes we have to take risks. We can’t just wander around forever. We’d starve.”
It took him some time to finish cutting all the meat he could off the dead sheep, and he also took the heart, liver, kidneys and brain. He wove grass into a crude frame and put it over the fire, held up by sticks just high enough to avoid it catching alight, and then laid as many pieces of meat on it as he could manage. He left them there to cure and ate the pieces he’d already cooked. They were burnt on the outside and raw on the inside, but absolutely delicious. He had to force himself not to bolt it all down in a few bites.
Curing the rest of the meat was a crude and unreliable process. He’d had to figure out how to do it through trial and error, and his technique still wasn’t perfect, but if this worked there was enough to keep him going for at least a week. The organs, though, would have to be eaten today. Not immediately, however. He wrapped them up in leaves and put them aside for later. Skade would probably want some.
Now for the hide. Here he was at more of an advantage; his father, a tanner and leather worker, had taught him how to cure a fresh skin when he was just a boy. It was a smelly and unpleasant business, but he’d had practice.
He didn’t have a vat or a bowl, so he gingerly lifted the hide in his arms and carried it to the pool. The water was brown not just because of the decaying leaves in it. There was a kind of bush growing around the edges that he recognised; it was known as leatherbush because its leaves could be used for tanning. It had turned the water brown, and it could do the same to leather.
He made a small hole in the edge of the hide and threaded a thin strip of torn cloth through it, tied one end to the trunk of a leatherbush that stood on the very edge of the bank, and then dropped the hide into the water. It sank, and he left it there to soak. He’d come back later to check on it. The sheep’s brain would be useful, too, so he made a mental note not to eat it.
When he got back to the camp, he found that one of the sticks holding up the frame over the fire was starting to char. He hastily moved it and then turned the pieces of meat over. They were starting to dry out already.
Skandar was still sitting where he’d been before. He was watching Skade balefully, and when Arren looked at her he realised she was returning the look. She hadn’t moved, which was why he hadn’t noticed that she was awake, but her eyes were open and fixed on Skandar.
“Are you feeling better?” said Arren.
She looked at him, and then at Skandar. “You are a griffiner?”
“Uh—well, this is Skandar,” said Arren. “D’you want something to eat?” he added, indicating the meat. “There’s plenty.”
Skade looked away. “No.”
“Come on,” said Arren. “You’ve got to eat. You need to get your strength back. You look half-starved.”
Skade stared blankly at the sky and said nothing.
“Honestly,” said Arren. “I don’t mind. I just want to help you, Skade.”
She looked at him. “Why?”
The question caught him by surprise. “What d’you mean, why? Why do I need a reason? You’re human, that’s why.”
Skade laughed softly. “Fool.”
4
Fugitives
Skade remained uncommunicative for the rest of that day and continued to refuse the food Arren offered her. She also refused to let him dry her dress over the fire. In fact, she showed no interest in anything around her, though she watched both him and Skandar closely as they moved around the camp, her golden eyes taking in everything. Arren left her alone and busied himself with smoking the rest of the mutton and then tanning the sheepskin. It was hard work, but the pleasant prospect of having a blanket of sorts did a lot to motivate him. Once he had thoroughly cleaned the hide and had cured it with a combination of leatherbush-infused water and brains, he rinsed it off and then hung it up to dry. Tomorrow he’d soak and clean it again and give it a good going-over to make it more supple. It would be stiff and smelly, but he didn’t care.
The sun began to go down, and he began to cook the sheep’s organs. He didn’t like liver or kidneys very much, but they’d do. He offered some to Skandar, but the griffin groaned and looked away. “Not hungry.”
“All right. Oh, I got you the lizard I promised.”
Skandar regarded the pathetic corpse of the skink, and then snapped it up. “Good lizard,” he mumbled, with what Arren was just able to recognise as sarcasm.
“It was pretty big,” he said. “I haven’t seen many skinks that big.” He looked in Skade’s direction and saw she had finally moved. She’d pushed the robe off and was sitting with her back to a tree, still watching him.
“Feeling better now?” said Arren.
Skade was looking at the offal staked over the fire. “I am hungry,” she said at last.
“Well, you’re welcome to it,” said Arren, very relieved. “I’ll give you some once it’s ready.”
He gave her the heart and a large chunk of liver, and she ate them ravenously. She also ate the berries he’d been saving and the roots and even the grubs.
Arren couldn’t help it; he grinned. “So, you really were hungry,” he said.
Skade licked her fingers clean. “Yes.”
“Do you feel better now?”
“A little,” said Skade. She still looked wary, but her demeanour was less hostile.
“So,” said Arren, sitting down with his own food, “where are you from, Skade? How did you get out here?”
Skade was silent for a long time. “I am from Withypool,” she said at last.
Arren gaped at her. “You’re what? But that’s on the other side of the country!”
“Yes,” said Skade.
Withypool was one of the great griffiner capitals, and its lands bordered those of Eagleholm. Arren had never been there, but he’d heard it was near the coast. “What’s it like?” he asked.
S
kade thought about it. “Beautiful.”
“Is it really next to the sea?”
“A small flight away,” said Skade. “But the land is flat. You can see it from the top of the Eyrie.”
“I’ve never seen the sea before,” said Arren. “Does it really breathe?”
“It moves,” said Skade. “The water rises up and throws itself onto the land. At night it rises, and in the morning it returns.”
Arren tried to imagine it. “Magic,” he said aloud. “I’d love to see it one day. I’ve seen griffins use magic, but magical places—I’ve never seen one of those.” He cursed internally: he shouldn’t have said anything about griffins. If she realised he was—he cursed internally again. She already knew he spoke griffish. She’d been using it since the moment they had met, and though he had been answering her in Cymrian, he obviously understood it. “What’s the city like?” he asked hastily.
“It is very large,” said Skade. “Stone and mud brick, mostly. The Eyrie is at the top of a mountain, above the other buildings. But there is a great wall around the city, to protect it. And there is a fortress near the sea. We flew out to it every day. There are always three of us there, watching the sea.”
Once Withypool had constantly had to defend the coast against raiders from the East, Arren knew. But that had died down recently. “Who was the Master of the Eyrie?”
“Arakae.”
That didn’t sound like a human name. “Is he a good ruler?” said Arren.
“Yes. He is just and brave, and his human is cunning.”
“Wait—Arakae is a griffin?”
“Of course,” said Skade. “A griffiner is not master of his griffin. Without Arakae, the Lord Ruel would not be a ruler of humans.”
Arren supposed that was true. In Eagleholm, people had deferred to the griffins at least as much as to their human partners, if not more so. After all, as soon as he had lost Eluna and the news had spread, he had lost everything. Without her, there was no respect from anyone. Even so, it was always the human who was the lord or lady, and the one people thought of first. Arren knew why: though the griffin was the more powerful and revered of the two, the human was the one other humans understood and could relate to. Humans saw the world in terms of other humans. And that would mean that griffins would see it in terms of—
